


Drowning On Air

by WhyNotFly



Series: The Aro Archives [1]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Aromantic Martin, Aromantic Peter, Just two coworkers discussing devotion, and the lack thereof, they're not aromantic at each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-22
Updated: 2020-04-22
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:40:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23795524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhyNotFly/pseuds/WhyNotFly
Summary: “You never answered my question.”“You were serious about that?”  Martin takes a moment to scroll back through his head, trying to remember what Peter’s excuse for bothering him had even been in the first place.  He’s got a voice like a white noise machine.  Easy to tune out.“Do you love him?”  Peter presses, and Martin is almost taken aback by his single minded focus.  It’s not like him.
Series: The Aro Archives [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1714381
Comments: 8
Kudos: 124
Collections: Aspec Martin Blackwood Week





	Drowning On Air

“That Jon of yours,” Peter says, leaning his full weight against what was Elias’ desk but has slipped down like rain through cracks into being Martin’s own. “What do you get out of him?”

Martin sighs. “I really don’t have the energy to entertain you right now, Peter. Not to mention the pile of scheduling you left me with.”

“I assure you that watching you pining and sighing through the condensation dripping down your windows is in no way entertaining.” Peter’s long coat dangles loose around his torso as he leans forward. Has he lost weight? “I’m trying to make a concession, a, er, what do you call it? I’m compromising. Taking a step into your dismal world of eyes and knowing and actually trying to _understand_.”

“Don’t strain anything,” Martin grumbles under his breath. He lets his head slump forward to bonk against Elias’ lit monitor. His lit monitor. “Is this the part where I get scandalized at your admission that you stalk me and we get thoroughly distracted from both your point _and_ me getting any work done?”

“I just assumed you knew about all that,” Peter says with a shrug, not deigning to look apologetic in the least. For a man who doesn’t want to take up any space, he has a real problem with stepping down.

“I did.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“Knowing is not the same thing as enjoying, Peter.” Martin lifts his head off the computer and turns to face Peter, gritting his teeth against the words he really wants to say which are too inflammatory even for a boss he has zero respect for and who physically cannot fire him. It is a gratifying change of pace, however, to be working for someone who isn’t a mindreader. Opens Martin up to have lots of lovely, stress-relieving rants behind the sloped annoyance of his eyebrows.

“See?” Peter says, and Martin thinks it might be a _joke_. “I don’t understand you types at all. I thought knowing things was like foreplay for your lot.”

“Fun fact, not every person unwillingly conscripted into the service of a dread power is the same. Some of us don’t particularly enjoy being spied on, in fact I’d wager that most of us don’t.”

“Elias does.” The spark in Peter’s eye betrays an inside joke that Martin isn’t privy to. Peter enjoys that, saying things to Martin when he’s really only talking to himself. He isn’t sure if the man is trying to be purposefully antagonistic or he’s just not used to having someone else actually involved in the conversation.

“If you haven’t noticed, I’m nothing like Elias.”

Peter braces his hands on the desk and leans back over it as if he needs the full perspective to let his eyes rove up and down Martin where he sits hunched and glowering in Elias’ chair. “If you say so.”

Martin pointedly swivels his chair away, back towards Elias’ computer and the task at hand. “I believe I said something about _mountains of work to do_ , Peter.”

“You even sound like him,” Peter mumbles. This is the part where Peter tends to get bored of interpersonal interaction and fades away, leaving Martin to his solitude. His interruptions are annoying, but they’re blissfully short. But when Martin glances away from the spreadsheet he’d opened back up, Peter is still there. Staring at him. 

“What?”

“You never answered my question.”

“You were serious about that?” Martin takes a moment to scroll back through his head, trying to remember what Peter’s excuse for bothering him had even been in the first place. He’s got a voice like a white noise machine. Easy to tune out.

“Do you love him?” Peter presses, and Martin is almost taken aback by his single minded focus. It’s not like him.

“If this is some kind of scheme to remind me how horribly lonely I am then—”

“No. No you’re doing, you’re doing just fine, Martin. I just want to hear your thoughts.” The ever-present mist in Peter’s eyes almost seems to burn away for a moment and Martin can see the faded blue-green of his irises.

Martin shifts uncomfortably in the chair that is not his. He doesn’t know how to face Peter like this. He’s never _seen_ Peter like this. “Of course I do.”

“Of course you love him?”

Guilt twists its way through Martin’s chest and he has to look away. “He’s a good person. He’s worked hard. He deserves to be happy, and he deserves to be safe. I want that for him, and I’m willing to do this for him. Of course I love him.”

Peter hums thoughtfully. “Is that what love is? Sacrificing yourself for someone else’s happiness?”

“Do you want me to say yes?” Martin hunches his shoulders.

“I don’t _want_ you to say anything. Well, I want to hear your honest opinion.” A heavy hand lands on Martin’s shoulder and he looks up to see Peter standing over him with his usual empty, genial smile. “I figured if anyone could help me out it would be you.”

“Y-you,” Martin can’t help but pull a face, “you have a _love problem?_ ”

Peter taps a finger against his chin slowly. “In a manner of speaking, I suppose. My problem is love itself. I don’t understand it. I was hoping someone like you with your,” Peter waves a hand up and down in front of Martin’s face, “eye connections, and apparent affability would be able to give me a quick rundown on how it works.”

“How it works,” Martin repeats, slowly.

“Just teach me how!” Peter says, cheerfully. He takes a step back and pops himself up to sit on the edge of Elias’ desk.

“I don’t think it works like that?” Martin pushes himself back away from the desk so that he has a bit of breathing room. “I mean, it’s very different for everyone I would assume. And I think it’s pretty impossible to explain. What brought this on?”

“I admire you, you know. You’re an incredibly impressive young man, Martin.” Peter picks up a pen off the desk and spins it absentmindedly around his finger. “Such conviction from such a small and foreign emotion. I’d just like to get to know you better. How you tick.”

“Now _you_ sound like Elias,” Martin grumbles. 

“And I’d like to know what I’m missing out on.” Peter wraps his arms around his chest in a mock hug and rocks back and forth. “All those warm fuzzies.”

“Love is, I don’t know. I’m the wrong person to ask.” Martin drops his head and stares down at the plush carpeting as if he could see right through it. “Sometimes it’s just a decision. To keep going because it feels right. Feels like you should.”

“That’s not exactly what I was expecting,” Peter says with a frown. “Where’s the passion? Where’s the fire?”

“Sorry to disappoint you,” Martin snaps, tearing his gaze away from what he can never see. “Guess I just don’t burn right.”

“We really are birds of a feather, aren’t we, Martin?” Peter hasn’t gotten his answers, but he still seems pleased. He grins with all his too-white teeth. 

“I don’t have to love Jon to matter.”

“Of course you don’t. You matter to _me_.” Peter hops down off the desk and ruffles a hand affectionately through Martin’s hair.

“For completing your plan to save the world.”

“I enjoy the world with people in it.” Peter shrugs. “Isn’t that a form of love?”

“I…” Martin looks helplessly up at Peter. “I suppose so?”

“You are an excellent teacher. Much better than Elias at explaining things.” Peter winks and Martin is deeply unsure of what it’s meant to imply.

“I’m not lonely because I don’t know how to love people, and neither are you.”

“No,” Peter muses, “if love was the only kind of connection that mattered I would have a much easier time of things.”

Martin stares helplessly after Peter as he strides away towards the door, still processing what the odd conversation had entailed. 

“Peter,” he calls out before Peter can leave, and the man turns back to face Martin with one raised eyebrow. “Jon deserves to be loved. That’s why I want to love him. Just deciding so doesn’t make it less real.”

“I know.” Peter smiles and it’s almost warm. “I’ve found people tend to care about the people they trade themselves away for. No matter how self-destructive they already are.”

Martin bristles, but Peter continues on before he can slip in another word.

“For my part, though, when it comes to love, I think I’d rather die alone.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I have a lot of aro feelings and they spill out of my hands like a thousand fingerling potatoes and bounce all over the tma cast. If you like this one, I've got other aro fics in this series, and hopefully I'll be adding even more! Happy Aspec Martin Blackwood week everyone :D
> 
> If you like my work, you can find my on tumblr [@apatheticbutterflies](https://apatheticbutterflies.tumblr.com/), I post writing and meta and I'm very friendly I promise!!


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